


Glitter In The Air

by WilmaKins



Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Angst, Angst and Feels, BAMF Steve Rogers, Blow Jobs, Body Modification, Body Worship, Bottom Bucky Barnes, Bottom Tony Stark, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Canon Divergence - Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Come Swallowing, Dark Steve Rogers, Deepthroating, Fix-It, Getting Together, Hand Jobs, Hurt Steve Rogers, Introspection, Light Dom/sub, M/M, Mind Control Aftermath & Recovery, Multi, Mutual Pining, Pining, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Post-Endgame, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Protective Steve Rogers, Psychological Trauma, References to Depression, Rimming, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, Superfamily, Threesome - M/M/M, Time Travel, Time Travel Fix-It, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Top Bucky Barnes, Top Steve Rogers, Top Tony Stark, Trauma
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-22
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-11 23:34:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29625720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WilmaKins/pseuds/WilmaKins
Summary: After the events of Endgame, Steve looks at a world left traumatised by the snap, and the blip - and the countless alien threats that had come before that. A world that tortured Bucky for seventy years, a world that persecuted his friends, a world where Tony's heart broke a thousand times before he died.Steve looks at this world where they supposedly won, and he thinks...I could do better than this.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers, James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers/Tony Stark, James "Bucky" Barnes/Tony Stark, Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 41
Kudos: 104
Collections: Marvel Trumps Hate 2020





	1. All The Broken Happy Ever Afters

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BTheHufflepuff208](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BTheHufflepuff208/gifts).



> We begin this WilmaKins fic with the traditional ‘bombardment of notes’ 😊 
> 
> Firstly, my overwhelming gratitude to BtheHufflepuff, not only for bidding on me in this years MTH, but also for her incredible input into this project - honestly, I kind of feel like I should be listing her as a co-writer. And I’m so excited about this prompt, and incredibly grateful to her for her help in bringing it to life.
> 
> As always, this work is still being written, so tags may get updated. Feel free to let me know if you think I have overlooked a tag. 
> 
> A few warnings that I would really appreciate people taking the time to read, wordy though this is:  
> 1\. Buckle in, this is going to be a long one 😂If it matches the plan, it’s going to be 25 chapters long and basically span the entire MCU time period… ahem. However, if it helps, big chunks of the content are already written - So, barring any catastrophes, you can look forward to an update every other Monday  
> 2\. This is my first ever Stuckony Fic! (and yes, I am terribly nervous about it…) So, for those of you who know me from my Stony works, please be warned, this will be a new pairing. Also, as this is also the note section for chapter one, I should probably mention that this chapter does focus more on Steve and Tony’s relationship, simply because of where it falls in events - but it is very much my intention to have all three characters be equals in this relationship and this fic, and for different parts of the relationship to be the focus at different times. Just for anyone who is worried about my Stony roots showing through - that is certainly not the intention, at least.  
> 3\. This fic features a slightly darker interpretation of Steve. This is not actually intended to be a depiction of, or commentary on, the Steve we see in canon - rather, it’s supposed to explore one way that his character might have developed from there, had things turned out a certain way. Therefore, he still very much has his roots in MCU Steve as we know him, and won’t be doing anything cruel or evil - but I will be exploring what might’ve led him to some more complex moral choices, and how his outlook might’ve changed from there. This is all written by someone who loves Steve very much. If you would like more details before you proceed, please just message me  
> 4\. On which note, please be aware that Steve will at times be critical of or come into conflict with some of the other Avengers. I genuinely don’t think this will come across as character bashing - I hope it will always be clear where these criticisms are really coming from, and that they don’t represent a critique of the character overall… but, if I’m being cautious… it maybe doesn’t come across as very Wanda friendly… Again, feel free to message me with any specific questions!  
> 5\. Please be aware that this fic deals with some pretty intense themes. It will show Steve struggling with trauma, including times when he questions the value of therapy and thinks that life is meaningless. Hopefully, the fic puts all of this into the proper context, and allows Steve to unpack and overcome those thoughts as it progresses - but if you would like more details before you read, again, please just let me know!
> 
> I shall try to keep notes at a minimum from here on out, but will of course include specific content warnings where appropriate.
> 
> All feedback is welcome and gratefully received.
> 
> Enjoy!

Steve had lived though the end of the world enough times to know - this time was different. 

He was still standing at the edge of the lake, half an hour after Tony’s memorial had floated over the horizon. Everyone else had long since shuffled back over towards the decking, but Steve couldn’t bring himself to move… He knew that it wouldn’t be long before someone noticed that he was missing, that Bucky or maybe Sam would appear soon to check on him, and drag him back into the real world… 

He still expected Tony to appear at any moment. 

Even while he was mourning him, Steve couldn’t quite shake the habit of preparing for the next time he saw Tony.

It didn’t help that he’d lived with this feeling for years before Tony d-

Before Thanos.

In the years before Thanos, Steve had often caught himself thinking ‘ _ I could ask Tony… _ ’ before he remembered that, actually, he couldn’t - that he and Tony weren’t friends anymore. There had been so many times that Steve had caught a glimpse of a dark haired stranger, and his heart had clenched, before he remembered that it couldn’t be him… 

For so long, Steve’s lifeline in these moments had been the splinter of hope that he  _ would _ see Tony again. However big the gulf between them, Tony had always been out there somewhere. Steve could flinch away from the ominous dread of  _ never _ , once. 

He knew he hadn’t let that go yet. He knew, however horrible the last few days had been, it still hadn’t really hit him. 

The breeze kicked up, sending a ripple across the water that caught the sun in a flash of blinding white. Steve’s neck twinged as he glanced away from it, a belated reminder of how long he’d been standing fixed in this position. His eyes watered, at the wind and the brightness and the pain in his back-

He had to take a few long, deliberate breaths to keep it at that. 

He’d spent the last week alternating between bouts of uncontrollable sobbing and disorienting numbness… He’d decided that the second one was better. More bearable, at least. 

He just couldn’t start crying again. Not now.

Steve had tried to tell himself that he’d been here before. The panic attacks, the nightmares, the surges of overwhelming grief… the nothingness. The deep depression he fell into after losing Bucky, the trauma he went through after waking up in the 21st century, the crisis he faced after the first snap…

But they were all different.

_ This _ was different.

Despite his best attempts at denial, Steve couldn’t erase that cold sense of foreboding - this strange feeling that he was already living beyond the end of his own story. That, somewhere, he’d already worked out a horrible truth, and he just didn’t want to look at it. 

And he knew he couldn’t outrun it forever.

He knew, eventually it would really hit him.

It would be the end of everything, when that happened.

He heard the sound of footsteps softly crunching through the dead leaves and waterlogged twigs behind him… coming closer. A wash of panic rose up in his chest; that same jarringly detached adrenaline that comes right before an anxiety attack. Automatically, he began searching his brain for isolated items of small talk, pleasantries, vague acknowledgements -  _ anything  _ he could potentially use as a shield to real human interaction.

He hoped it was Sam. Not that Sam was easy to deflect, but Steve stood more chance with him than Bucky, who always knew what he was thinking-

And then he caught a glimpse of blonde hair out of the corner of his eye, and his heart froze in his chest.

It was Pepper.

That was, by some distance, the worst possible outcome.

He’d always found it hard enough to talk to Pepper  _ anyway _ . There was no safe line of small talk with her, no inconsequential remark or well intentioned courtesy - there never had been. Every conversation with Pepper had always started a spiral of shame and regret and jealousy, all with the embarrassed awareness that it was entirely one-sided. 

And that was before… Thanos.

Now, on top of all of that, Steve had the added guilt of feeling as though he’d taken something from her. That  _ he’d _ taken a gamble on the man they both loved - that he’d been the one to drag Tony back into the battle that she’d always been trying to drag him out of, that Steve was the reason all of her darkest premonitions had come true.

So, for a good few seconds, Steve kept his eyes locked on the horizon, his shoulders set and his face frozen in an expression of serious contemplation - not thinking about anything. 

Cowardice masquerading as stoicism. 

He was starting to worry that it was becoming his calling card.

Eventually -  _ inevitably _ \- Pepper took the choice out of his hands.

“You know why we did the thing with the flowers on the raft?” She asked, her voice raw and weary beneath the pleasant, professional tone. Steve didn’t even think about the question before he shook his head. “It’s because of a poem, or a reading, or something, that Tony liked,” she explained. “I think he heard it at a funeral he went to… It’s about a group of people standing on the shore, watching a magnificent boat sail out over the horizon. And eventually it disappears, and the people are sad, because  _ he is gone _ . Until someone reminds them that the boat isn’t  _ gone _ \- it’s just that the people can’t see it anymore. The boat is travelling to strange and wonderful new places, as real and as beautiful as it ever was… And when it reaches that new place, as it was built and destined to do, the people on  _ that _ shore will all cheer, and they will say,  _ he is here. _ ”

Steve felt his features arrange themselves into a passive smile, entirely of their own accord. Apparently, he’d gone through these motions enough times that they were now literally hardwired into his biology. 

All the well meaning platitudes he’d suffered through after Bucky, all the metaphors and fables people used to explain his experience of waking up in the future - the countless agents and counsellors and even team mates who’d told him that ‘everything happened for a reason…’

Steve had been gritting his teeth through sentiments like that since his mom died. 

_ But it’s  _ _ more _ _ than that, this time. _

_ It’s worse than that. _

_ It’s different. _

“It’s okay, I hate all that stuff too,” Pepper sighed, like she could read his mind. “ _ Death is a natural part of life, we all return to the dust we were made from… Part of the journey is the end… _ ” Out of the corner of his eye, Steve saw the way her shoulders slumped, her head falling forward like a begrudging surrender. “I always thought it all sounded so hollow… Just something people said when there really  _ wasn’t _ anything useful to say, because God knows you can’t just say,  _ this is terrible and it’ll never get any better _ . And, to be honest, I thought the same thing about the boat story, the first time Tony told me. It sounded nice, but it didn’t really mean anything… But actually, I  _ do _ quite like that one, now…”

Steve swallowed hard, still failing to dislodge the thickness from his throat. 

“Why?” He asked, because he couldn’t think of any other possible response. 

“Because I know he literally  _ is _ out there somewhere right now. In an actual place, not a hypothetical afterlife made of my memories,” Pepper replied.

And turned to look at him-

Steve really hadn’t meant to meet her eye, but the reflex ran its course before he could stop it. 

He found himself face to face with Pepper Potts for the first time since… a long, long time ago. 

Since that cold, dark night half a decade earlier, when Steve had felt Tony’s thin and fragile frame slip out of his arms and into hers… 

His heart began to beat in his ears, strangely distant from him, like he was listening to it through a thick wall. A piercing alarm sounded from somewhere deep in his psyche, a primordial instinct he’d never needed before now, an awareness…  _ this could be it.  _ He could  _ feel _ her walking him over that dangerous ground, showing him the very thing he was running from, leading him to the end of everything. 

...It was fitting, that it should be her. 

“It’s different,” Pepper carried on, before he could stop her. “Thinking that Tony left forever, that he’s living a life somewhere without me and I’ll never see him again… that’s hard. Thinking that Morgan never got to know him is…” She dropped her eyes briefly, and took a sharp little breath. “But it’s still different, to thinking that he just  _ isn’t _ anymore.”

Steve nodded sombrely, finding that his head felt too heavy and too light all at once, trying to make sense of an entirely inappropriate instinct to physically run from her-

“But then, I didn’t love him the way that you do.”

Steve was faintly amazed by the purely human spike of interest that still managed to make itself known, over all the other reactions. The little voice that  _ still _ wanted to ask her what she meant by that - that simply wanted to know. 

It seemed so at odds with the much louder, more visceral desire  _ not _ to know. Not to have any more regrets to nurse, not to have to think about it… not to have to know that it didn’t matter anyway, now. 

“That’s not true,” he whispered, his voice hoarse and tight. “And he knew how much you loved him-”

“Yes, he did,” Pepper interrupted calmly, the strangest smile on her face… “And I know how much he loved me, and it was important, and valuable, and real -  _ maybe  _ the most important relationship he had in this lifetime… But we weren’t a couple, you know.”

Steve’s mind just fell completely silent.

He had no pre prepared ideas for that one, no clue what meaningless pleasantry might be an appropriate response… and he was trying so hard not to think...

“Since when?” He heard himself ask.

“Since Thanos, the first time around,” Pepper sighed sadly. “We  _ were _ giving it another go. We really were planning to get married… And Tony was right in the middle of telling me that it was going to be different this time, that he was done with Avenging, that nothing was more important to him than making our dinner reservation that night… and then, well, you know what happened next.”

Steve nodded again, gratuitously, trying very hard not to think about what had happened next. 

“He thought I was going to be mad at him,” Pepper continued. “And, I don’t know, maybe I would have been if… things had worked out differently. But after the snap, and everything else, I don’t know - maybe it’s just that I finally got some perspective. A lot of things were very clear, after that. That I could never be with Tony like that, for a start. We were just too different, and wanted such different things, and we were tearing each other to pieces trying to stay together… And it wasn’t sad. It was a really nice conversation, actually. That was the day that I finally realised I was always meant to be Tony’s friend. That there was nothing lesser about that, nothing wrong with it. That everything could just be better that way…”

And then she broke into a warmer, more genuine smile, her gaze drifting to the inside of her own head for a second before she focused on Steve again, and added,

“And then obviously, three days later, I found out I was pregnant.”

“So...then you got married…” Steve spoke robotically, over a growing buzzing in his head. 

“Well yes,” Pepper laughed softly, “but not the way you’re thinking of it. I mean, we talked about it briefly -  _ giving it another go for the kid _ … just sounded awful to both of us. So, then we started talking about co-parenting and vacation schedules and… we just figured, why bother with any of that? Why not just live together, and get to spend all of our time with her… The getting married part was his idea. A way to make sure we both had every legal protection. I think there was even a part of him that wanted to make sure she was  _ legitimate _ , as old fashioned as that sounds. He didn’t even care about that sort of thing. But I think it was just that he didn’t want there to be  _ anything _ she didn’t have, anything anyone could say to her, ever… Like maybe he knew this might happen one day…” she sighed, and shook her head - and then, as calmly as you like, she added, “and it’s not as though he was holding out to get married to anyone for real - because he already knew he’d never marry you, and he already knew he’d never marry anyone else. So.”

Steve actually warned himself to stay silent. He tried to pinch his lips together. He knew, no good could possibly come of asking. 

But he just couldn’t not ask.

“Never marry me?” He whispered so softly that he wasn’t sure she could have heard it. But she smiled.

“He was in love with you,” she said, as though there was something sweet about it. “I think, looking back, he was always in love with you… But by the time he got to yelling at you in the compound that night, he’d finally worked it out. That it was you, and it was always going to be you-” 

She stuttered to a pause when Steve actually let out a hiss of pain. 

Oh, and here was  _ that _ conflict.

A stab of human agony so intense that there was no way he could bear it. A crushing wave of guilt and regret, a thousand fragments of thought-

_ The time we wasted- _

_ The pain I caused him- _

_ The things I never said- _

_ The things we could have had- _

_ If only I’d  _ _ just- _

Such overwhelming grief and despair that it immediately closed his throat, flooded his veins with icy adrenaline, tore at his heart-

But he couldn’t do anything about it. He couldn’t try to rationalise it, or put it into context - he couldn’t even let himself think about it. Any attempt to make this better would just  _ prove _ that nothing would ever be better again, that nothing mattered-

_ This pain is the last human feeling I will ever know. The last real thing. _

_ When this pain ends, it all ends. _

“Why are you telling me this?” He gasped, relieved to at least be free of any pretence that this was a polite conversation. 

“Because he’s not here to tell you himself,” Pepper replied, simply. “And I know that, if he were, he’d tell you. I’m telling you this because I think it’s what my best friend would have wanted.”

_ So why  _ _ didn’t _ _ he tell me? _

_ He wouldn’t have said that- _

_ He didn’t really think that- _

_ If only I could’ve told him- _

“Thank you,” came out as a strangled whisper, as Steve began to physically back away from her-

“Would you rather me tell you why I’m mad at you?” She enquired coolly, a harder edge on her expression as she raised an eyebrow in challenge. Steve froze. “It’s not for dragging him back out there, if that’s what you’re worried about,” Pepper informed him, taking a step closer, just to fill the gap he’d made. “I made my peace with that part of Tony the day I realised that we weren’t meant to be a couple. I knew that he’d always go running out there, whether you were there to push him into it or not. I told him he had to do it. I pushed him, too.”

Steve would’ve liked to be comforted by that, at least a little bit, just for a moment. It sounded like the sort of revelation that should be comforting. 

But the thing about revelations is, you can’t allow just one. 

So Steve kept his mind quiet, his eyes locked somewhere beyond where Pepper was standing, wordlessly willing the whole thing to go away.

Wondering if he wasn’t ready to accept oblivion after all...

“What I  _ am _ mad at you for -  _ furious _ at you for, still - is breaking his heart,” Pepper added, with an air of finality. “And, even more than that, for letting other people break his heart, so many times. And I wouldn’t be mad at you for that, if I didn’t know you loved him too-”

“Pepper,” Steve interrupted, flinching away from her. “I can’t - it’s isn’t… I didn’t…”

“Am I wrong?” She challenged.

And Steve simply couldn’t tell her yes. 

He just couldn’t bear to put those words out into the universe.

...Not right at the end, like this.

“No,” Steve exhaled, his entire body deflating along with it. “No, you’re right, I love him, and I let him down, so many times… and there are so many things I should have done, and so many things that will never stop hurting…”

“But what?” Pepper prompted. 

And already Steve felt more distant from the answer he was about to give. 

_ Aware  _ that she would be offended by it, without really feeling… like he wasn’t really in this conversation at all any more.

“But it doesn’t matter, now,” he surrendered. 

And there it was, the predictable flash of confused indignation, the pursing of the lips…

“Did he  _ ever _ matter?” She asked - and Steve actually let go of a bitter laugh.

Well, there it was.  _ The _ question.

“I honestly don’t know if things  _ used _ to matter,” Steve spoke more firmly now. “Maybe, before we fucked everything up - or even before  _ we lost _ , five years ago… Maybe there was order in the world then. Or maybe everything was always meaningless, and I just never knew. But…”

And he glanced back over to the decking, where Tony’s gathered team mates had already slipped into generic conversation. He could feel Pepper looking along with him… he could swear that he felt the exact same flavour of contempt, radiating from her.

“They think we won,” Steve said it for the both of them. “Even Wanda, and Thor, people who lost everything too - still, they’re talking like they lost everything in the name of victory. But it isn’t a victory. I’m not even sure it’s better than the mess we were trying to clear up…” 

A montage of images flashed up in Steve’s mind, footage collected from the news reports and television specials of the last week, arranged in no particular order… Just endless films of confused and frightened people, reports of those who died in the chaos, countless politicians and specialists listing all of the problems that the world now had to face, all over again… And then his memory settled on one image in particular. 

An interview that ran on a local news channel a few days earlier, that Steve had barely cast a glance at the time. He could picture it so clearly now, right down to the vase of carnations on the table. 

The woman who was driving down an empty freeway as  _ the blip _ returned everyone to the exact spot where they’d last been - including the people who had been driving on that freeway, five years earlier. Not only did that woman kill the two people she ran over, and rob two families of the joyous reunion they’d only just dared to hope for, but her one year old daughter was killed in the crash. 

Steve saw her now, sitting between the husband she’d mourned once and the new partner who was mourning with her, her once dead son sitting in the space where his now dead sister would have been… Her glassy expression and heavy breathing, as the men on either side of her answered every question she was asked. 

Specifically, Steve remembered the saccharine news anchor asking about her own injuries - the way the woman frowned, momentarily confused, before shaking her head,  _ oh, those, no, those aren’t real. _

“...Maybe five years ago, we had a chance to make a difference. I don’t know. Maybe, if we’d just left things alone, the worlds would’ve adapted, and then Morgan's kids wouldn’t see the point of fixing it - maybe they’d try to stop anyone who did. Think that person was as mad as Thanos, insanely pursuing their own idea of a better world, even though it would hurt so many people who lived in this one…” Steve could feel himself spiralling. Slipping away from saying any of this to her, falling into the horrible freedom of simply saying it outloud… “Maybe that’s what we were doing anyway. Maybe every person who lost someone when they came  _ back _ , or made a life in those five years, or lived better in a less populated world, maybe they’re thinking of us as mad titans…”

“You think Thanos was right, Steve?”

“I don’t think there is any such thing!” Steve blurted, more angrily. “I think for as long as one person can crawl out of the wreckage, that person will think they won - and if there isn’t one person left, well then, who's going to know either way?” His voice kicked up a few decibels, his chest tightening as though it were squeezing the words out of him - or being sucked dry by them, one of the two. “I think we’re just not prepared to accept that everything is terrible, and if we were, we’d see that we were already long past that point. And even if  _ we _ weren’t already past that point - there’s some timeline out there where they are…”

He felt like he was freefalling, watching the ground rush at him ever faster as it came closer to the end. There was a weird exhilaration under the terror, a panicked instinct to kick his legs at the law of gravity, to grit his teeth even when it couldn’t possibly make a difference.

This was the snapping point.

Why this was more than just the greatest defeat he’d ever suffered-

Why it was  _ different _ .

“There’s always a version of me out there fucking it up, always a version saving the day,” Steve finally acknowledged. “Every decision I’ve ever made is being played out in every possible way, and now I’ve got the power to just jump between them - so what did any of them ever matter in the first place? No matter what I do now, all those mistakes will still be out there - that moment in Siberia is just a place I could visit a thousand times,  _ always _ happening. The life I just fucked up will always be there. Like all the timelines we screwed over to save this one. Even if I  _ could _ go back and-”

“So, you’ve thought about it then?” Pepper demanded. 

“...No,” he stumbled, looking away from her again. “I haven’t. I  _ can’t _ .”

And Pepper let go of a soft breath, and nodded - to herself, rather than Steve - and looked back out over the lake again…

The silence might actually have been worse.

“You know what your problem is, Steve,” she said eventually, her voice calm again, “you always  _ think _ you know.”

“Well, I don’t think I know  _ anything _ anymore, if that helps,” Steve muttered bitterly, with no idea where it’d come from.

“Yes you do,” Pepper corrected him. “You’re  _ still  _ doing it. Like when you first met Tony, and you watched a few hours of footage and assumed you knew him - you assumed that was  _ it _ . Like when Zemo gave you a few tantalising details and you thought you had the full picture, and didn’t stop to question why he gave you those details in the first place. Like when you were so quick to blame Tony for ULTRON, even though I bet you still couldn’t explain  _ how _ that all happened - and still, you don’t stop to ask yourself what you  _ don’t _ know.”

Steve began to recognise that she sounded hurt, and angry. Somehow, it didn’t rob the words of any of their power - which was a brutal, direct power, at this stage. 

“It isn’t that, this time,” he whispered, feeling as though he was trying to explain to the universe itself. “Maybe that  _ is _ my problem, or was my problem, back when I was still trying to do something… But it’s  _ different _ this time. It’s not just hurt or confused it’s…  _ lost _ . It’s  _ nothing _ , it’s… having nowhere to start, no idea what it means to win, no idea what anything means in a world where you can just go back and-” his voice cracked, and he was forced to stop and swallow his heartbeat before he tried again. “It’s not that  _ he _ doesn’t matter, Pepper. I love him-”

“Lov _ ed _ ,” Pepper reminded him, “matter _ ed _ . Past tense.”

“No,” Steve told her with a sharp shake of his head. “I will  _ always _ love him - and even if -  _ whatever _ happens… That will never be past tense.”

“But Tony is, Steve,” Pepper told him. “If you can’t face the idea of putting that right, then you’re going to have to face what you’re left with.”

And, ridiculous though it was, Steve shook his head again, because he couldn’t face the idea of doing either. 

And that wasn’t even the biggest conflict in his head. 

“If it gives this whole thing any more meaning, you should remember that it’s still not an option for most of the people in mourning right now.” Pepper mumbled, as though it was intended as a snarky aside - 

And then she decided to run with it

“I  _ can’t _ take Morgan back to a past version of Tony. There  _ isn’t _ a version of him out there that’s perfect for her, there isn’t a whole other timeline she could just step into. Only versions of her father who don’t even know her, who never saw her as a baby, who’d have to learn to love her all over again. World where everything is already set in motion, where  _ I _ can’t do anything to stop it all from going to shit - but you could,” she narrowed her gaze at him again, silently adding,  _ the bits you personally turned to shit, at least _ . “And if it makes you feel better about it to think that it’s special and risky, then fine - it’s a chance that only you have. If that’s what gives a thing meaning, just know that only  _ you _ could go back to a time before all this happened, and change things. You could make him happy. You could make a thousand happy moments that would always be happening, places he could be forever,” and then the briefest flicker of a joyless smirk, her tone sharpening as she continued, “you don’t  _ know _ that those moments will happen if you don’t make them. And maybe they will only ever happen to one version of him. Maybe they won’t change what happened to my Tony, or whatever other Tony’s exist - but wasn’t it you that said,  _ you can’t save everyone? _ Didn’t you stake the whole world on that idea once? That, even if you can’t save every Tony, and every timeline, you might still be the only one who could save  _ that _ Tony, and the billions of people in that world - that this might be your only chance to do it? Does that make it matter?”

For one horrible second, Steve thought she was looking at him for an answer. But then he saw her swallow, and centre herself again, pointedly dragging herself back to that cool, detached persona for the big finish - which might actually have been the entirety of what she came to say to him. 

“You, and only you, have a chance to make a better world. Maybe not for everyone who might ever exist - but for all the millions and millions of people who exist in that one. For Nat. For Vision. Maybe even for Coulson, and JARVIS, and Peitro. For  _ Tony _ . And if you already ‘know’ it wouldn’t matter, then I guess there’s nothing in the world that will sway you. It doesn’t usually. But I’m saying it anyway. You have one last chance to choose  _ him. _ He’d tell you to take that chance, if he could. He’d tell you he loved you, that he always loved you, that you really were  _ this _ close to having it all work out differently - do you really  _ know _ that it wouldn’t matter, Steve?”

This time, it was quite clear she wasn’t waiting for an answer. Without another word, she turned to walk away from him, her back melting back into its usual proud posture as she moved. 

It wasn’t really that Steve watched her go, so much as his eyes followed her. In the same way his legs kept him upright, and his lungs carried on their endless, thankless cycle… automatically. By default. 

Empty.

There were no thoughts anymore, and he was so detached from whatever these feelings were that they’d lost all meaning. Just physical symptoms of panic and distress that weren’t registering… The buzzing void that fills the gap, when the adrenaline is spent.

His eyes passed over the crowd, simply a blurred, dark shape against the green of the lawn and the blue of the sky… Until he heard a little high pitched shriek - something he only recognised as a delighted laugh after it had snagged his attention.

He saw Morgan standing on the porch, finally roused from her innocent melancholy by Rhodey, kneeling down in front of her, holding a closed fist out between them. 

Steve watched her nod enthusiastically, instantly recognisable as  _ yes, again _ .

He saw Rhodey catch her eye,  _ you ready _ ?

And then the same joyous laugh, as Rhodey threw a handful of glitter up into the air - a burst of sparkles that was immediately swept up into the wind, a bright flash of light completing one delicate spiral before it disappeared into everything…

Morgan looked up in wonderment, her eyes wide with excitement at the things' existence. Just that. She looked so much like Tony that it took Steve’s breath away. 

He snapped to look back over the lake again, letting his gaze settle somewhere past the horizon…

It was Pepper's voice that whispered to him, 

_ He is gone _

*

Steve didn’t remember much of the rest of that day.

He knew that eventually Bucky had come to find him, and - mercifully - not said anything other than,  _ it’s time to go home _ . Steve remembered being relieved, and grateful for that, and a little bit embarrassed that he’d ever expected anything else.

And then not much of anything, before he found himself lying on his bed, staring up through his ceiling, vaguely wondering  _ how _ they got home…

It was a strange feeling. An unsettling sort of clarity, like the moment between when you realise you’re dreaming and when you actually wake up. 

Out of the nothing, Steve found himself asking - really quite calmly - whether he might just be having a nervous breakdown. 

From his position of detached awareness, it certainly seemed logical. It was probably what a therapist would tell him, if he hadn’t written the lot of them off when he learned that his last counselor worked for Hydra-

_ It’s normal to feel these things, after what you’ve been through _

_ It’s natural to feel frightened or hopeless, to believe that this grief is special and will never get better _

_ It’s your trauma and your illness talking _

Steve had read the books, and run the group sessions - he knew all of this.

He knew that he wasn’t immune to trauma. He didn’t think he was so special that he couldn’t  _ possibly _ crack. He knew that the things he had been through, and the pressure he’d been under, and the things he had seen, were enough to break a person.

But he couldn’t help thinking that all of the foundations of therapy - of all of human understanding - were built on certainties that he had disproved. That his experience was beyond the realm of human understanding, that it made chaos out of the therapies that would aim to put it into order. 

What if Steve had simply seen something beyond the capacity of human comprehension, something that man was just never meant to know - something that no therapist, no mere mortal, could ever make sense of? 

What if Steve  _ had _ found proof that all life was essentially meaningless, and nothing mattered? Wasn’t all psychology ultimately an attempt to demonstrate that those thoughts were irrational?  _ Can _ psychology - even in theory - do anything in a world where there can be no pretending?

Somewhere, he vaguely wondered how the therapists of the world  _ were _ doing their jobs - assuming, that is, that they weren’t all in need of therapy themselves. What you say to someone who suffers with a terrible anxiety that they’re about to crumble into dust, if not,  _ are you sure that’s rational? _

He asked himself whether it even mattered if he was having a nervous breakdown.

He acknowledged that lots of people feel that way  _ because _ they’re having a breakdown.

...He noted that very few of those people would’ve beaten up a past version of themselves, getting the upper hand by mentioning a different version of the best friend they'd seen die twice. 

So maybe comparing his experience with other people was pointless. 

...He wondered what had happened to that Steve. 

...It would’ve been a hell of a thing to find out, on that day of all days. 

There was an overwhelming sense of just how many possible answers there were to that question - or rather, how many questions there were behind that answer. 

Would that Steve even have believed it, thinking that it came from Loki? Would he have chased all the wrong leads looking for Bucky, thinking that Loki must somehow be involved? Had Steve tipped off Hydra without tipping off the alternate Avengers - had he inadvertently created a world where Hydra won? Was another version of him off on a single minded manhunt, never growing closer to the team or coming to terms with the 21st Century, because he was already engrossed in the search for Bucky... 

...Or maybe that Steve went to Tony for help. That Steve would’ve been innocent of any knowledge about Tony’s parents. He wouldn’t have any reason to worry about hurting Tony’s feelings, or losing him, or being forced to choose between him and Bucky - or any of the things that Steve had been trying to avoid while he was actively making them happen, in this reality. 

Maybe there was a reality out there where he and Tony looked for Bucky together, found out the truth about Tony’s parents together… A world where they were together the first time Thanos turned up.

Maybe that  _ would _ have made all the difference…

...Would that timeline be erased, when they put the infinity stones back? 

...A whole world where he and Tony ended up together, where Bucky was saved in 2012 and had a team to come back to, where Thanos never won at all… A world that Steve had been to and taken part in and remembered, a world that  _ had _ existed - just… gone? Snapped out of reality? So that it never happened at all?

...Or would there always be another timeline out there somewhere, in which an infinity stone briefly flickered, and people carried on living and dying according to the events that Steve had helped set in motion - people who only existed as separate entities  _ because _ he’d set a different chain of events in motion?

... _ Does it matter? _

Steve screwed up his face, and remembered that he wasn’t supposed to be thinking about any of this…

But he  _ was _ thinking about it, now.

Whether it was Tony’s memorial, or what Pepper has said, or simply because after a week of treading water he’d finally run out of fight, he didn’t know. But apparently he’d reached the end of his denial.

...It wasn’t as horrible as he’d been expecting.

...It wasn’t anything, really. Not yet at least.

Just a weary sort of heaviness, as his mind started laying out these unbearable questions for him, going through the motions like a man walking out in front of a firing squad and lighting a cigarette.

_ Either _ , they had dropped into another reality and made monumental changes to formative events, and an entire world was living with the consequences of their actions - actions they took purely in the interest of their own reality, by the way. 

_ Or _ , they were about to erase millions of lives, billions and billions of years of potential existence, all of which might have been better than the world they’d been defending.

There was no right answer.

_ Either _ , you used time travel, which meant abandoning one version of your loved ones in a damaged reality, while you went off to make a better one for yourself… 

_ Or _ , you didn’t use time travel, which meant leaving another version of your loved ones to live with all of your traumas and mistakes, even though you could avoid it for them - 

There was no completely selfless choice here.

_ Either, _ he could find meaning and happiness and a sense of victory out of even this monumental loss - or, possibly, accept a discovery that would allow him to undo  _ any _ loss - but either way, it would mean there were no stakes anymore. No reason to try at anything, because whatever happened he could just start over, or decide he won. 

_ Or,  _ there really were things so awful that it was worth fighting against them, losses so devastating that there would be no recovering from them… in which case, surely this was one. And no amount of positive thinking or reorganizing his thoughts would change that.

There was no good outcome to this question. 

It didn’t even matter whether he knew what ‘right’ and ‘selfless’ and ‘good’ meant any more. These things cancelled each other out. They were the lofty concepts of smug Political Science professors, designed to demonstrate the complexity of the question and the limits of human ethics. Never intended to be answered, or to provide any answers. Never intended to be  _ lived _ .

Steve was sure he could pick any option, and make it fit. He could decide on and construct a morality around one of them. Maybe, with diligent effort, he could pretend he really believed it - maybe, eventually, he really would…

Would that be the advice of a therapist, he wondered? Simply  _ decide _ that there was meaning?

_ But that’s what you’ve been doing all along - just deciding that you know. _

He heard it in Pepper's voice, even though he couldn’t be sure those had been her exact words…

It was strange to think back to that conversation, now. He felt like he could remember it so vividly, until he reached out for one of the details, and then it all slipped away from him. Logically, he knew that Pepper was just a person in pain, like he was. That she didn’t have some omnipotent insight or any higher authority - that she didn’t have all the answers either.

But somehow, her voice seeped into his head, until the insecure whispers that lived in his mind started to sound like her.

_ He loved you. Which means not only did you throw away the only thing you ever wanted, but you also broke his heart. _

_ You let other people break his heart, you never spoke up for him - and it  _ _ would _ _ have mattered. _

_ If you won’t face this question, you’ll have to face never seeing him again _

...He still couldn’t believe that he’d never see Tony again. Even now that he was making himself think the words - it still didn’t  _ feel _ real.

...Like he couldn’t imagine a hypothetical horror as awful as his own life. 

_ So, why don’t you go back for him… _

Steve felt his ribs tighten then, his melancholy weariness sharpening into panic again as he recognised that this was a whole different type of question. His face flushed hot as he warned himself,  _ I can’t… _

There were too many ethical riddles, too many things he couldn’t know

The issue was just to big to fit in his head - he didn’t know where to start

He was sure that his whole concept of reality, his very sense of himself, would crumble if he went down that road - he had been pushed to the edge already, simply because he’d been forced to acknowledge the theory. If he had to make it  _ real _ , if he had to turn these questions into  _ choices _ \- God, his head would explode-

_ So, you’re saying you’re  _ _ not _ _ going back for him? That you will really never see him again? _

And Steve shook his head, all alone in his room.  _ I can’t _ .

It wasn’t the same, this time.

It was all too much.

He couldn’t deal with losing Tony at the same time as working out what loss even meant-

He didn’t have another purpose to focus on, a  _ reason _ to carry on walking with this grief on his back - 

He couldn’t bear the thought of what they might have had, how close they came - he couldn’t stand the idea that this was meant to be a  _ victory _ .

_ So, what then? _ Pepper asked him, in that same flint-edged professional tone.

And Steve grited his teeth, his muscles tensing to the point of pain, as a scalding, frustrated injustice flooded his body -  _ I don’t know! _

_ No Steve - you don’t  _ _ want _ _ to know. _

The frustration cooled immediately, extinguished down to embers by a wave of miserable shame. No, he didn’t want to know. Because he knew that if he stopped running from this question then he would have answered it - past tense. Looking at it would mean it that vanished forever, one way or the other, possibly taking all hope of  _ one day _ along with it - 

And, really, that had been his resistance all along.

It wasn’t Pepper that had put the idea into his head. This plan had lived in the shadows of Steve’s mind since the day… of the snap. And maybe he’d been telling himself that he couldn’t think about it because it was all too huge and unfathomable, or because the impulse was too ridiculous and reckless to dignify with consideration… But really, it was just that he hadn’t wanted to let it go. 

Because, until he knew for sure that it was reckless, for as long as it was only  _ probably _ ridiculous, there was still the chance. If he hadn’t yet failed to comprehend it, he couldn’t know for sure that it was impossible. It was one last question to be answered, one last Hail Mary left to dismiss, before there was only the end…

But it was time for this to hit him. 

_ So, why don’t you go back for him? _

_ Because I couldn’t make him happy in this life and I have no reason to think I could make him happy in another.  _

… Had always been the first unspoken fear, something Steve didn’t want to think about for so many reasons

Although…

That was before he had any reason to think that Tony loved him...

But if that  _ was _ true, then maybe Steve could’ve made Tony happy in even this traumatic reality, had a few things worked out differently. It would mean that Tony had seen this flawed and incomplete version of Steve and still wanted something from him, even before Steve had learned from those mistakes...

_ Knowing what I know now, maybe I could make him  _ _ really _ _ happy... _

There was an electric flicker in his gut that wasn’t entirely pleasant…

But was undeniably optimistic.

Steve pinched his lips, his fingers curling against his duvet in an attempt to disperse that charge. Pointedly, he dismissed the temptation to get carried away with hope, making himself focus on the reasons he had to stay in this timeline-

Those were the points he wanted to argue with. 

_ Because I couldn’t leave Bucky - and everyone else in this reality - to go chasing my own happy ending. _

...Although, now that he thought about it… Steve wasn’t sure what he  _ could _ do for anyone in this reality.

...Not now that he’d thought about the good he could do in a different timeline. 

At least in a different timeline, Steve would have the advantage of prior knowledge. Whatever his personal limitations or crises, he could still be useful in the past. He could tell Tony about Hydra and his parents the right way, save Bucky so much earlier, save all those people who died in DC and Lagos and Sokovia… Warn them all about Loki. And Ultron. And Thanos.

In  _ this  _ reality, Steve was just broken. As much as he wanted to be there for Bucky… Now that he really tried to picture it, Steve couldn’t see how he wouldn’t make it worse. How could he could tell Bucky that he was scared they’d irreparably damaged the earth, or ask if all life was meaningless, or admit that he sometimes cried so much over Tony that he was physically sick - when Bucky was still trying to adapt to his life, and overcoming trauma of his own? How could he keep that from Bucky? How could he  _ pretend _ around Bucky? 

Bucky would know…

Bucky was  _ already _ looking after him, a week after being brought back from the dust…

Steve felt shapelessly uncomfortable about all that. 

On the one hand, it was the first time he’d really confronted how little support he could offer - or the idea that he might actually do Bucky harm, just by being around him. There was a curling of guilt at that idea… and sadness. 

But then, if there  _ was _ a better road Steve could take...

...If this actually made it easier to decide which road that was-

_ But right and wrong don’t mean anything any more _

And that was the real issue with thinking about any of this. 

The cascade of undeniably relevant questions that  _ no one _ could answer-

Questions he couldn’t refuse to answer, because everything was a choice.

His head throbbed sharply, as though maybe it had been aching for a while and had snapped at Steve for not noticing. His eyes were sore and heavy, his spine laying jagged against his skin… and he was tired. So very tired. 

_ If you can just go back and redo every action, do any of them mean anything? _ Came in Steve’s own voice - and the rebuttal came in Pepper’s.

_ But you  _ _ can’t _ _ always just go back and make it right - not even you. This is a rare and fleeting chance… _

He geared himself up to think about it, and found he simply didn’t have the energy. Like someone coming to a crashing halt after a desperate run and finding they’d actually reached their limit miles ago. Every thought seemed painfully sluggish, all of a sudden-

But that didn’t mean he could silence them. 

Really, it just meant he was helpless against them - that there was nothing more efficient he could do than be troubled by these thoughts at random. 

_ You were the one who said you can’t save everybody, but you can’t let that stop you from saving anybody - do you still think that? _

_ Do you still care about being a ‘good person’, if nothing matters - or are you worried that nothing matters  _ _ because _ _ you don’t know how to be good anymore?  _

_ Because you know  _ _ that’s _ _ what matters really? _

_ If you  _ _ can _ _ go back to other timelines and make them better, and if that  _ _ does _ _ matter - does that mean you should go back to all of them? _

_...Just travel around the cosmos, trying to fix other realities? _

Somewhere in the middle of all that, the voice had changed. 

As the weight of his exhaustion finally started to overwhelm the intensity of his neurosis, and the words all started to melt together, it was Tony’s voice that spoke to him…

_ You know what you want to do. _

_ You’re telling yourself that it’s impossible  _ _ because _ _ it’s what you want - because you feel guilty and selfish for doing what you want… _

_ But what if it just so happened that it was the right thing to do? _

_ What if you didn’t think of it as a happy ending - just the next chapter?  _

_ If you were going to spend it helping people, as best you could? _

Steve felt himself sinking further into the darkness, swallowed into sleep too quickly and too slowly all at once, the world closing around him…

Tony’s voice, whispering into his dreams.

_ What if you don’t know? _

_ What if you could? _


	2. Half past the point of no return

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NGL, I'm both excited and nervous about this chapter - partly, because I know this scene was very important to my bidder, and I'm just really hoping I've done it justice for them 🤞🤞🤞  
> But also because it involves people losing their temper - which is great fun to write, but does necessitate a typically Wilma-esque level of notes-
> 
> 1\. As I hope is made abundantly clear throughout, Steve is in a very bad place and is reacting partly out of grief and trauma. As such, not everything he says is entirely fair or rational - and neither is it an accurate reflection of his balanced views. I hope the chapter also makes clear that this is out of character for Steve (that is kind of the point, in fact) so please don't take this as a reflection of my view of Steve in general.  
> 2\. I hope it's made equally clear that Wanda is also in a very bad place, and that her outbursts are likewise affected by her grief - this really isn't intended to be an anti-Wanda statement, just an idea of what might happen if you get two very hurt, very angry people with a difference of opinion together at a party (spoilers, sometimes they fight)  
> 3\. TBH, all of the above to various degrees for other characters - although, I'll be honest, Wanda does mainly get the brunt of this, for no other reason than I thought it the most likely clash under the circumstances. 
> 
> Finally, I'm sorry that this chapter once again focuses very much on Steve's relationship with Tony and not much on Bucky - the chapter breaks were altered in the editing process, so now you have a very Bucky heavy chapter to look forward to in two weeks time 😀
> 
> Enjoy!

Steve woke up the following morning feeling hungover. 

It wasn’t only the bruised ache around his eyes, or the thickness of his headache. It was the way his emotions weighed down on him like a cold blanket, the feeling of being entirely submerged in sadness and anxiety, from the moment he opened his eyes-

It was almost nostalgic. 

Immediately, it reminded him of the aimless, melodramatic misery of his youth. It made him think of a time when he wasn’t obliged to rationalise and compartmentalise every emotion, a time when he _could_ just feel unhappy without knowing the reason. 

It felt… Indulgent. 

In fact, for the first time since he was a teenager, Steve didn’t bully himself out of bed. He actually pulled the duvet back up over his head, and closed his eyes again - and let himself be sad…

Disillusioned and bitter...

And angry. 

God, he hadn’t realised just how angry he was… How angry he’d been for a long, long time. He’d been repressing that impulse more than any other, telling himself again and again that he mustn’t react emotionally, that he had to put himself aside, that there were more important things to worry about-

There had always been something more important to worry about. 

But now he knew that nothing really mattered. 

And now there was nothing left to be afraid of, nothing left to outrun. 

Now, there was no reason to be selfless… no real meaning to the word ‘selfless’, no substance to the idea…

For so long, Steve had blindly accepted a certain definition of these things… That selfish and human were basically interchangeable. That any slip in his constant efforts would be a failing of some kind.

It wasn’t so much that he was questioning any of that, so much as that he’d just stopped believing any of it - he didn’t believe anything, anymore. 

Without that practiced mantra of self control and self sacrifice, there was nothing standing between Steve and his darker thoughts. Nothing to pull him back from being furious over every injustice he’d ever suffered through. All at once, he was so angry at so many people, angry at hundreds of thousands of people that he’d never even known, angry at the whole damn world.

It was horrible and vicious. And...overwhelming, and free. And still somehow not much of anything… Or too much of nothing...or something.

Eventually the heat of his own breath against the sheets became claustrophobic. Steve pulled his head free with a petulant groan, curling the duvet into his fists. He clenched the frustration deeper into his muscles, the way he might’ve jabbed at a toothache… Until at last it burned out into an insolent sort of sadness, and then he indulged in that. 

He felt like a devout man who had suddenly lost all faith in God. The worst part was that he still wanted to be angry at God, that he had to keep correcting his own internal logic - that he didn’t know what to correct it to. He’d relied on this unspoken understanding for so long that he’d forgotten where it had even come from. 

He didn’t know what to do without it, even now that he was without it.

In a fit of pique, Steve threw the covers aside and sat himself up, shuffling to the edge of the bed before he asked himself where he was going. 

Somewhere, it occurred to him that he _did_ have plans for the day - that he was supposed to be meeting what was left of the Avengers that afternoon. 

He didn’t know what any part of that meant, anymore. 

When he thought of the Avengers, he still thought of an especially courageous little Shawarma restaurant in New York, in 2012. He remembered there being an _idea_ , a shared mission and identity that he _understood_ , something that had continued to make sense even as the lineup changed and the headquarters were moved and the chain of command was literally blown up and torn down… Still, he was sure he’d just known what it meant to be an Avenger. What they stood for. What linked them to each other. 

Now he didn’t know whether the Avengers still existed. Who had the right to call themselves that, who decided, on what grounds. Whether every Sorcerer of Kamar-Taj and every member of the Dora Milaje was now an Avenger, seeing as they had answered the Assemble call in the fight against Thanos. Whether he had any stronger link to Thor than to Valkyrie, if he was more loyal to Clint than to Peter Quill, as much a teammate to Shuri as to Bruce…

Whether belonging to something, by definition, meant there had to be someone who didn’t belong. Whether there had to be _some_ thread of shared understanding between them, some experience or responsibility they all had in common, however different they otherwise were…

Somewhere in his irritable philosophising and unanswered questions, it occurred to Steve that all of the people meeting up that afternoon would have different concepts of time. Different experiences of time. Different realities. 

From Steve’s perspective it had only been ten years since the war, and five whole years since the first snap. Steve’s body was a hundred years old, and it was forty years old. Steve’s mind felt ancient and weary, and it felt vulnerable and clueless and new, all at once. 

From Bucky’s perspective, the time between the wars had been vague and movable, a constant progress of the years at too fast a pace, seen through eyes that weren’t his own and remembered in his own nightmares… To Bucky, the first snap was just over a week ago. 

To Scott, the first snap was months ago. 

To Sam and Wanda, it was still 2019. That was the shared experience of half the world now - if that half put their foot down and insisted that it _was_ still 2019, that that would be the calendar they were using, would it matter? Was that interpretation even _wrong_ , if it was the lived experience of as many people as it wasn’t? Would it have mattered if _all_ the people of the world had been turned to dust, and come back all at once - would it still be 2019 _then_ , if there was no one to contradict it? Would the years in between have been real, if not for people like Steve and Bruce and Thor to vouch for them?

They were all living in different timelines anyway... 

All getting to know unfamiliar versions of one another, all with fundamentally different experiences of the universe, brought together at a particular place in a particular reality, that was all...

... Some _where_ it was always 2019. 

2019 was a place Steve could visit any time he liked - a place where he had never asked himself these horrible questions or seen these impossible ideas. 

… A place where he and Tony were together, and happy. Where Bucky was secure and supported - where maybe Tony and Bucky were friends. Somewhere Nat was still alive. A place where they beat Thanos the first time around, a place where time travel didn’t exist…

Well, until Steve went there. Then, he supposed, time travel would exist…

...Steve could never go anywhere that time travel didn’t exist. 

No one could...

And with that, in the middle of all his aimless musings, Steve recognised that he could never really go _back_ . That he hadn’t really been given the power to travel through _time_ …

He could go to a _place_ where everything was different - where all the people had different memories, and nothing looked the same, and a whole new range of things were possible. He could take a trip and watch another version of himself have a different youth and feel different things and become a different person…

But _he_ could never unknow these inhuman ideas, or stop these relentless questions. He could never be young again. He could never have his first kiss again, or wonder what it was like to be tall, or feel the rush of shocked attraction that came with seeing Tony for the very first time. 

Even time travel hadn’t given him the chance to relive his life. It wouldn’t undo his mistakes, or erase his trauma, or rid him of any one of his regrets

It would only give him the chance to start the _next_ part of his life somewhere else…

He had the strangest feeling of deja vu, and wondered if this was one of the many things Pepper had tried to explain to him back when he was in a different haze.

Or maybe something Tony had told him in a dream.

_You really can’t undo any of the pain that you’ve already been through. It’s already happened. Not even the power of the gods can change that…_

...Odd, that _that_ should be the first thing to make him feel better.

*

Of course, Steve hadn’t felt better for long. 

The rest of his morning was spent bouncing between irritated and miserable, his head full of relentless, meaningless chatter… It was repetitive, and exhausting…

 _But_.

There _was_ something nice about indulging his emotions like this, being angry and resentful, not caring what anyone else was going through

Well, maybe not _nice_ … But compulsive, certainly. Liberating...

And then Sam had arrived to pick him up for the BBQ. 

And Steve had _tried_ to reign it in a little bit. A well worn voice in his head had reminded him that _it wasn’t Sam’s fault_ \- and the thought of hurting a friends feelings was about the only thing that could tug a social response from Steve, at that point. 

But it still had to compete with his newfound pleasure in petulance. For the first time ever, there was a voice asking why he _couldn’t_ be angry, why Sam should expect him to be stoic and inspirational right now, why Steve should have to put Sam’s feelings before his own…

In the end, it came out as an awkward sort of compromise. 

Steve knew that Sam was aware of the atmosphere - and he did nothing to make it better. 

He couldn’t bring himself to be rude, and he still flinched away from anything spiteful - but he couldn't bring himself to make the effort, either.

They’d spent most of the drive in silence. Steve had answered all of Sam’s well meaning questions as politely - and as briefly - as possible, until eventually Sam stopped trying. 

The discomfort of it wore off gradually, minute by minute, until Steve found himself asking why he’d ever felt obliged to make conversation in the middle of his personal trauma. Until he’d started to feel bitter over the years he’d wasted trying to be better than human, when it had never been necessary, and never been possible- 

And never mattered anyway.

He felt the car settle into silence, blinking as he refocused his eyes on the scenery around them - vaguely surprised to find that they’d arrived. 

It wasn’t Clint’s original farmhouse. Like billions of people around the world, Mrs Barton and her children had woken from a deep sleep to find that their home was no longer theirs - in their case, because Clint had abandoned it to become a lone vigilante, leaving it to be claimed by a string of squatters before it had been claimed by the elements. 

But it reminded Steve of Clint’s old farm house. Clearly, the Bartons had particular tastes, and even though this place was smaller than their last one, and closer to the city, it still had that _feel_ to it... Just being here was enough to bring back the smell of cut grass and damp wood. 

The memory of Natasha, asking about the baby that was going to be named after her. The child who was now named after _two_ people who’d given their lives for Clint.

He remembered the rush of exhilaration as he argued with Tony in the yard, the thrill of sexual tension and unrequited love… Things Steve would never feel again, no matter where he went back to…

“We don’t have to go, you know,” Sam interrupted his thoughts, dragging him back into the world with a disorienting jolt. 

“I’m sorry?”

“If you’re not up to it, we don’t have to go today,” Sam repeated, leaning his weight on the steering wheel and trying to catch Steve’s eye. “I can just start the car up again, and take you back home. It’s not a big deal. Everyone will understand.”

 _Will they really?_ Steve thought, sullenly.

He didn’t even know where that particular thought had come from, other than maybe it was just one of those things he was never allowed to think, taking its turn to stretch its legs along with all the other ugly human impulses. 

Right now, it _felt_ as though no one would understand. 

Right now, it was really very tempting to lean into that. To allow himself the sense of injustice and self-pity, to be consumed by his own pain and be entitled to it…

It was oddly tempting to simply tell Sam the truth. To burden him with the impossible problems of Steve’s existence, the unsolvable depth of his grief… To tell Sam that he didn’t really know how he got here in the first place, that he’d followed Sam’s lead without any real reason - that, if he hadn’t already arranged for Sam to pick him up, Steve probably _would_ still be sitting on the end of his bed… and that it was all much of a muchness to him. That it didn’t matter whether he was here or at home, and he didn’t care what happened next.

Steve already knew it would do no good to share any of that. That there _was_ no right answer, that it wouldn’t feel better to talk. 

He was just so tired of _never_ doing these things.

Part of him wanted to lash out at Sam in a way he never had - simply _because_ he never had. Because there had never been a time in his life when he hadn’t been trying to contain his emotions and control his temper and outrun his trauma - however variable the results. 

Even fresh out of the ice, facing the prospect of an alien invasion, while under the control of the mind stone, Steve still hadn’t completely let go. He’d lost his cool, yes, and been more controlled by his emotions than he’d like - but still, that whole time, he’d resisted the urge to scream or swear or cry. He’d been _trying_ to focus on the mission, however fuzzy his head felt.

Even that horrible moment in Siberia, when Steve’s entire world came crashing down around him, when he was still reeling in shock and confusion and a lot of guilt, still, he’d tried to keep his wits about him. And yes, he had said some stupid things, and he would always wish he hadn’t frozen like that when Tony asked him if he knew - but he’d _tried_. He’d tried to think though his panic, dismissed so many of his thoughts as unhelpful, done his best to focus. 

By then it wouldn’t even have occurred to Steve to scream or cry or beg. By then, those were things he just didn’t do. 

He glanced up at Sam, who was still looking at him with such genuine concern, and he wondered what would happen if he were to really let go, now…

“No, it’s okay,” Steve sighed, opening his door to punctuate the point. “It’s going to take some time, but it’s probably not a good idea for me to sit all alone in my room. Thank you, though.”

And there was no emotion in the delivery, no attempt made to sell it - but it was as much effort as he could manage. 

He got out of the car before Sam had the chance to answer him, not sure whether he’d really heard a sad sigh in reply or if he’d just imagined it. After that it was simply a matter of following his feet, wandering mindlessly towards the little bubble of activity at the centre of the yard. 

The others were already waiting for them, seated around a long wooden picnic table. Clint was at one end of it, sitting in a canvas deckchair, keeping his eye on the BBQ - Steve was faintly relieved to see that Laura and the kids had decided to sit this one out. Wanda, Thor and Scott were on one of the benches, Bruce, Rhodey and Bucky on the other, none of them looking especially comfortable. 

Steve could feel the gaps where Nat and Vision and Tony should have been. 

“Hey, you’re here!” Scott announced, just a bit too jovially. From the performative edge, Steve had to guess that he was trying to lighten the mood - although, of course, it had the opposite effect. 

_Actually, I’m just as miserable as I was yesterday, when it would’ve been insensitive to greet anyone like that…_

And Steve didn’t bother to ask himself if it was unfair or entitled or immature.

It was all he could do to keep from snapping and saying it outloud. 

Instead, he answered with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes and sank to perch on the bench next to Bucky, nodding an acknowledgement to the rest of the group as Sam took a seat opposite him.

“Why, how long have you been waiting for us?” Sam joked.

“ _I’m_ waiting for a burger,” Thor corrected, throwing an exaggerated glance in Clint's direction.

“I keep telling you, you’ll just end up with them burnt on the outside and raw in the middle…” Clint sighed, giving the BBQ a token jab anyway…

It all sounded so forced. 

Everyone was sitting too stiffly, the conversation was stilted and awkward… The air was thick. 

It didn’t take Steve long to recognise that it wasn’t only his bad mood causing the atmosphere. He could feel the tension in Bucky’s arms, the aura of anxiety that surrounded him. He could see the weight of sadness bearing down on Rhodey's shoulders. Wanda’s expression was every bit as dark and hopeless as Steve felt. Dotted between them were the people who, in this moment at least, were responding with desperation - exaggerated attempts at a different tone, ridiculous bids to fill the silence-

A grudging determination to turn this event into a celebration, and pretend those in attendance were a team. 

“Hey, while we’re waiting, and since everyone’s here, why don’t we have a toast?” Scott suggested, somewhere between earnest and hysterical now. Bruce and Thor took their glasses too enthusiastically, Clint and Sam took theirs dutifully, while Rhodey and Bucky moved robotically-

And Steve and Wanda didn’t move at all.

“So, I know that this fight had a huge cost…” Scott began nervously, glancing between Steve and Wanda before he carried on, “but I really think that Tony and Vision - and Nat - would be so proud that we won it.”

Steve felt his jaw tighten in indignation, that Scott should presume to know what Tony - or Nat - would think, that he felt he had any right to decide which sacrifices were worth it-

That he’d said Tony’s name at all. 

“And I know it was important, to acknowledge everything we’ve lost, but, y’know, I think it’s just as important to acknowledge what we achieved,” Scott continued, settling into his own voice. “I mean, against all odds, we managed to fix this thing…”

 _No, we didn’t_. Steve thought, acerbically.

“We took on the greatest evil in the universe, and we won.”

_No, there were no winners. Just people less damaged by this than others, that’s all._

“This whole thing was literally impossible - but we _made_ it possible-”

“ _Tony_ made it possible.”

And it was only when he felt everyone turn to look at him that Steve realised that he’d said that last one out loud.

Automatically, a familiar voice reminded him, 

_It’s not Scott’s fault._

_You’re not the only person who’s suffering._

_They’re trying their best._

Those reactions were practised, and innate… and meaningless now. 

The new impulses were far more seductive - interesting and novel and real. It was _that_ reaction that straightened Steve’s spine and set his shoulders, that fixed his features into a defiant expression-

_Go on, say something._

“...Well, yeah, obviously,” Scott stammered, throwing a helpless glance in Sam’s direction. “I mean, without him, time travel is just the fevered dream of a madman, right? And yeah, that’s one of those things they said couldn’t be done, and he’s the one who made it work-”

And from the other end of the table, loud enough that everyone could hear it, Wanda gave a derisory snort.

Scott stuttered to a halt, a pure panic flashing up in his eyes.

Wanda looked up, right at Steve, her jaw set in steely defiance. Steve felt a spike of adrenaline, a primal sort of temper that he hadn’t felt since he was scrapping in a schoolyard in Brooklyn.

_She’s lost as much as anyone_

_She’s just lashing out because she’s hurt, and angry-_

But, oh, far more compelling than those tired old mantras…

 _Yeah, well_ _I’m_ _hurt and angry_

_Is anyone going to be thinking any of this about me?_

“I’m so tired of hearing about Tony Stark,” Wanda told him coldly.

“Are you really?” Steve snapped back, with such force that everyone at the table sat upright in unison. Even Wanda’s expression flickered at what was clearly a most unexpected reaction-

And Steve _liked_ the dark satisfaction that stirred, at that.

“If I remember rightly, you and your Nazi friends spent years trying to turn _you_ into a weapon, just so that you could kill Tony Stark - and then you just moved into _his_ house and no one ever mentioned it again,” Steve spat, not entirely sure where he was pulling these arguments from. “So, maybe you could just shut up and _put up_ with something for once.”

Somewhere to the right of him, someone gasped Steve’s name - more an unwitting exclamation than a comment. Wanda was so outraged that for a moment her face fell entirely blank, as Clint sat forward and tensed his shoulders. 

“You know what, this is my fault,” Scott announced theatrically. “I’m sorry, I’m terrible at toasts, I shouldn’t-”

“Tony Stark’s name is in every one of my nightmares,” Wanda cut him off, her voice low and sharp. “His inventions took everything from me. His politics ruined my country, twice. And I’ve never been allowed to say a word about it, because I trusted the wrong people when I was a messed up kid. I’ve just had to quietly accept that his inventions were meant to kill _other_ people’s parents. So you don’t know what I’ve _put up_ with.”

“Okay, guys-” Bruce attempted to cut in-

But Steve had caught the taste of blood, now.

His first hit of ugly, human rage - and he was hooked.

“You ever wonder how many people’s nightmare’s you’re in, Wanda?”

“Okay, Steve, you know what-” Sam tried more forcefully, to no avail.

“You ever wonder if _I_ get flashbacks to the horrible visions you put in my head? Or Nat, or Thor - or Bruce?” Steve demanded, gesturing sharply. “You think the people of Johannesburg get nightmares, Wanda? Or the people in Sokovia - which was just as much your fault as Tony’s, by the way. At least-”

“Seriously, _Steve_ ,” Clint interjected, leaning further forward, as though he was trying to shield Wanda from him. “This isn’t right - it isn’t _you_ . You _know_ how much Wanda has lost, and not just this week, and it isn’t really her you’re mad at-”

“Oh, say it to her!” Steve barked back. “No, go on, turn to your good friend Wanda and tell _her_ to drop it. Tell her how much _I’ve_ lost - _and not just this week -_ and that _I’m_ just angry and hurt. Tell _her_ it’s not really Tony she’s mad at, and that it’s a dick move to bring it up right now. Go on, I dare you.”

There was an audible intake of breath all around him. As Clint struggled to pull his arguments into words, Thor cast Bucky a loaded glance.

“Perhaps you’d like to say something?” He suggested, under his breath. 

“No,” Bucky replied, with a faux innocent shake of his head, as though he had no idea why Thor would even suggest it. 

Even in the midst of his breakdown, Steve felt a little tug of sentimental loyalty - a recognition that Bucky had had his back since Steve was immature and petulant the first time around. 

“And as for ‘this is not who you are’,” Steve carried on, “what, I’m usually better than this so now it’s my job to be better than this? She never makes the effort so now no one expects her to make the effort, is that it?”

“No,” Clint snapped back. “It’s because you’re being ridiculous. You’re trying to hurt her because you’re hurt, and that’s just not okay and you know it. You’re _not_ the only one who lost people-”

“And look at how you reacted when _you_ lost people!” Steve outright shouted. “ _You_ don’t get to tell me to handle my pain better, or get over it quicker. You became a serial killer when the people you loved died, so you can shut up about this not being okay. Like losing my temper at a BBQ is beneath my dignity - _but apparently not hers,_ ” he jabbed a finger in Wanda’s direction, purely to emphasise that he’d noticed how Clint had declined to call her out, even when challenged-

And then he saw the way Clint’s eyes had darkened - that one of his erratic, random attacks had apparently struck a nerve. 

“Tony wasn’t your wife, Steve,” Clint reminded him viciously. “He wasn’t even your friend - you hadn’t spoken to him for five fucking years before he died. So don’t talk to me like our pain was the same. It’s not even the same now. Nat _was_ a friend. _Nat_ sacrificed herself to make this whole thing possible, and she didn’t have to be dragged kicking and screaming into this fight - she’d already given everything to running the Avengers, for five of the worst years of anyone's life. And now you’re talking like Tony’s the one not getting enough attention, and telling _me_ that I should sympathise with _you_?”

Which, of course, touched a nerve right back. 

Steve’s muscles coiled in temper, his legs already tensed so that he could stand, and walk right over to Clint, and-

And then he felt the warmth of Bucky’s palm against his arm - not forceful, or aggressive. Just there. 

Steve’s resolved flickered, and he hesitated just long enough for Sam to attempt another intervention.

“It’s not that you can’t be angry, or that you’re wrong to get upset,” he started softly, speaking only to Steve - while Bruce spoke to Clint in the same low murmur at the other end of the table, saying something about everyone taking some space, something that Steve couldn’t make out over the buzz of shocked silence. 

“So, what _are_ you saying.” Steve muttered irritably, nothing more than a filler sentence.

“I’m saying that maybe you need to think about where all of this is really coming from,” Sam suggested-

And, in hindsight, it would be obvious that Sam was only asking him to think about his feelings. Pointing out - quite correctly - that his pain wasn’t down to anything Wanda had said or done. Giving him the opportunity to really lose his temper and rant about his actual issues, if he wanted-

But Steve was already in too much of a rage to see any of that. 

Clint’s words were still ringing in his head. Steve was already in an internal argument as to why Tony _was_ his friend, why their estrangement was nothing like that-

He slotted Sam’s intervention into it. He didn’t even know he had. 

“What, _you_ don’t think that Tony was my friend?” He challenged. “You don’t think that all this could _just_ be about him, and the fact that I miss him, and the fact that I’m having to sit here and listen to people worse than him badmouth him when he doesn’t deserve it-”

“What? No,” Sam shook his head, clearly baffled. “No, that’s not what I’m saying at all-”

“But you’re surprised I’m defending him?” Steve huffed. 

“Why shouldn't he be?” Wanda piped up - which did, _at last_ , earn her a disapproving glare from Bruce and Thor. Which she ignored. “When it’s not that long since you were leading most of us into war against him-”

“Is that what you thought that fight was about?” Steve shot back, sarcastically. “I thought you were only there because Tony asked you to stay indoors while he dealt with your many arrest warrants. Silly me.”

“And you agreed with him, did you?” Wanda asked, narrowing her eyes. 

Steve felt something inside him wilt, a cold void opening up in the middle of his fury.

“You know what, maybe we should all take a break,” Bruce suggested, gingerly.

“Until when?” Steve bit back. “You think any of us are going to be less hurt and bitter next week? Next year? _Ever?_ ”

“I think, maybe, when everyone has calmed down-”

“When _I’ve_ calmed down, you mean,” Steve corrected. “You don’t think _she’s_ going to have a think about things and come to me with an apology, do you? You mean let’s wait until _I’m_ reasonable enough to listen to all of this and then tell her she’s good?”

He didn’t know it at the time, but that may have been the moment he decided. The moment of blinding clarity in which he realised that this group of people would really never come together as a team again - and not just because of the layers of trauma and unresolved anger and interwoven mistakes that they would always be trying not to argue about. 

It was because they were strangers to each other now.

He cast his eyes over Clint, with his mohican and his battle scars, Thor, with his unkept beard and wild hair, Bruce, now a hybrid of himself and a big-green-rage-monster… 

Steve knew a version of these people once - but they’d all moved out of his life and gone their separate ways, and crossed paths with him again years later… as different people. Parallel versions of themselves. 

“Okay, this is simply pettiness now,” Thor sighed, and then fixed Steve with what was probably intended as a compassionate look. “If this is an enduring disagreement between the two of you, then perhaps it’s simply the case that you will drift apart - but that’s no reason to sow disagreement among us all, or assume the same things of all of us,” and then he leant forward slightly, a sad smile tugging at his lips very briefly before he refocused, and added, “you are not the only one who cared about him.”

And, again, it wasn’t Thor’s fault that Steve took it so badly. It was clear that he meant it to be comforting - and, in his defence, at any other moment, it might have worked. 

But as it was, Steve could only hear yet another person belittling the bond he shared with Tony. 

Yet another person reminding Steve that he wasn’t special, that his pain and his loss weren’t special - all the while expecting him to _be_ special, to handle that same pain so much better than anyone else did. 

“Really, you cared about Tony, did you?” Steve demanded - before he’d even bothered to think if that was true. Thor seemed to recognise that there was no point starting that argument, and with only the slightest flicker of hesitation, gestured to Rhodey.

“Well, I should think Rhodes-”

“Oh, we all know he’s not talking about me,” Rhodey interrupted, in the tone of someone who has been biting their tongue for half an hour. “And he’s not wrong.”

Thor let go of an exasperated sigh, like he wanted Rhodey to know how unhelpful that was.

“I simply meant-”

“Look, if you don’t want my opinion, don’t bring me into it,” Rhodey asserted coldly. “You want to bring up my feelings about Tony, then I’ll say a few things.” 

And then, as though in a flare of temper, he shot Wanda a knowing look. 

She just sneered at him.

“You’ll never walk again, and still you don’t even _understand_ why anyone would resent him,” she scoffed. And then opened her mouth to continue-

“I’ll _never walk again_ because Vision was too busy babying you to pay attention,” Rhodey snapped, before she could. “Like a lot of things went to shit because everyone was so busy worrying about your precious feelings-”

“Jesus, guys!” Scott yelled, waving his arms. He managed to shock the group into a brief lull, which he used to give them all an incredulous look. “For God’s sake - you’re _the Avengers-_ ”

“And you’re not,” Steve spat.

Scott stopped dead, eyes widening in such naked anguish-

It was the one and only point in the whole shameful affair that Steve actually _felt_ mean.

“Oh, right,” Scott croaked, nodding too vigorously, “right, right, cos I was only an Avenger in 2016, when I was risking everything to help you - _because you asked_.”

And Steve might even have stopped to apologise then, if only Scott had shut up.

“Which was back when Tony Stark was untrustworthy and short sighted, wasn’t it?” He carried on instead, his voice getting grittier as he spoke. “Look, I’m sorry if you’re offended that we don’t all suddenly share this vision of Saint Tony that you’ve just decided on right this minute, but some of us are still trying to help anyway.”

That humiliated emptiness in Steve’s chest began to harden, until he could feel it like a cold weight against his ribs. It dampened some of the fire in his anger - leaving a more resolved, more resolute rage in its place. 

“You know what Scott, you’re right. I _did_ side against Tony once, and _I was wrong_ \- and I realise now that you were all wrong to help me,” he announced-

Surprised by the immediate rush that came with it. 

Apparently this was something he’d been desperate to say, a burden that had laid heavy over him for so long that he’d forgotten it was there-

It wasn’t even that he really thought that. 

It was how long he’d been scared of thinking that. It was the wordless feeling of responsibility he’d carried since 2016, knowing that he’d talked so many other people into sharing his point of view. Knowing that he could never change his mind, even hypothetically, without casting the same judgement on all of his friends - friends who wouldn’t have been in that mess in the first place, if it weren’t for him. That shadowy understanding was the reason his regrets were still so ominous and murky. It was the reason he couldn’t talk about that particular trauma to anyone. 

Saying that out loud felt like ripping a rotten tooth out of his skull. For the time being, he didn’t care how much pain it had caused or even if it had done more harm than good in the long run - he was just overwhelmed with relief that it was over with.

“It was a stupid plan to stop an imaginary threat, and the whole thing was very unfair to Tony,” he continued, recognising the strange lightness that had bubbled up in his voice. “And when I look back, it's really obvious that we should have just told him, and that he probably would have fixed things better than we did, and I think were were all really stupid about the whole thing from start to finish,” he finished by throwing Scott a smug smile, _now_ _what are you going to say to me?_

And, if nothing else, it did at least silence Scott-

“Do you hear yourself?” Wanda gasped, shaking her head dismissively.

“Do you just _want_ to pick a fight, is that it?” Bucky asked her directly. 

“I don’t see why I should have to go along with this, just to avoid one,” she shot back. “Vision didn’t even _get_ a funeral. He was ten times the man Tony was, and no one even misses him. And now I’ve got to sit here silently, listening to everyone pretend Tony was a saint - oh, and now the two years we all gave up for _him_ ,” she didn’t even glance at Steve when she referred to him, “make us all stupid, apparently. And I’ve just got to sit here and listen to it, or else Steve will get upset?”

“Tony _made_ Vision,” Steve told her, bluntly. “And you tried to stop him, if you remember rightly. Vision would have died in his cradle, if it had been up to you.”

Wanda sucked in a sharp, trembling breath. 

He heard someone whisper, _that was a low blow_ \- although he had no idea who it was. 

And then Wanda pinched her lips together, blinking the film of tears away before she bit out,

“Tony made Vision because he’d already made Ultron. Everything Tony ever did was to redeem himself for some weapon he’d already made.”

“You were _every_ bit as responsible for that as he was,” Steve replied-

Because he was thinking of the break in at the scrapyard - the way Wanda and her brother had fought the Avengers on Ultrons behalf, actively helped him to steal the vibranium that would later become the core of Sokovia. 

Steve was thinking of the raid at Helen Cho’s lab, the fact that Wanda and Peitro had helped Ultron to take her hostage.

Steve didn’t even _know_ that-

“I didn’t _make_ him do anything,” Wanda snapped. “I just showed him the depth of his _own_ fear - he was the one who let himself be controlled by it. _He_ came up with the plan to do something about it, not me-”

“You did _what_?”

And Steve’s voice must’ve sounded every bit as outraged as he felt, because an entirely different sort of silence fell over the group then - like everyone was afraid to breathe. 

Wanda had stopped mid word, her lips still parted, her brow beginning to furrow in confusion.

“You showed him what?” Steve repeated, when Wanda didn’t answer him. She closed her mouth, her frown deepening - and then, just when Steve was about to lose his patience, Rhodey spoke up,

“That raid you guys went on, when you first found Loki’s sceptre,” he explained, cold and resigned, “she put a vision in Tony’s head of the end of the world, everyone dead except you - you were dying. You told Tony that he could’ve saved everyone, and asked why he didn’t do more, and then you died in his arms. She made him see that and then she let him take the mind stone. It was the beginning of the whole plan.”

“Not my plan,” Wanda corrected. “I never put any plan into his head - it’s a pretty big leap from telling someone they’re not doing enough, to them making an evil sentient android.”

And, actually the sharp edges on her tone _had_ started to soften. Her entire affect was just a little less sure, as though maybe her fury was finally burning out-

Steve didn’t hear it.

Steve didn’t even hear her speak, he was so shocked and appalled - his ears were literally ringing. A cushion of dazed numbness swelled up in his head, like an airbag. And then he remembered a throw away comment that Tony had once made about nightmares…

And another aside he’d once made about AI…

And another, and another, a horrible cascade of images all falling into place, making sense of something he hadn’t known he knew…

“You put that idea in his head…” Steve murmured, stunned, not even talking to her.

“No - that idea was in his head anyway,” Wanda answered, her words echoing from miles away..

_Everyone was dead - except you._

_You lived long enough to judge him, and blame him._

_You_ _were the one telling him he hadn’t done enough._

_That idea was in his head anyway…_

A loud, metallic clang snapped Steve to attention, and he glanced up to find Clint standing next to the BBQ he’d just slammed shut.

“Yeah, you know what, I think this is probably over,” he muttered, gesturing vaguely to the group-

Steve knew he _meant_ the BBQ.

But Steve was thinking of a little Shawarma restaurant near Bryant Park. 

The Avengers were all still strangers to one another then, and all from a completely different time to Steve. They ate that meal while Steve was still reeling from the greatest loss he’d ever known - 

And still, Steve had been sure he was at the beginning of something. 

Even before he really knew any of them, Steve had understood what he’d just become a part of. Even in the depth of trauma, he’d felt that ray of hope...

And now, once again, he felt as though he was sitting amongst strangers, surrounded by people who’d lived through a different history to him. Again, he was enduring the most powerful grief he’d ever known. This should have been a perfect allegory for that first meal they shared as a team - if they’d _really_ won, this would’ve been a wonderful moment to stop and admire how far they’d come together.

But they hadn’t won. 

They weren’t at the beginning of anything.

They weren’t a team. 

Not anymore. 

Somehow, Steve knew that revelation would persist, even after his temper had worn off - like his optimism had prevailed in spite of his temper, the last time. 

The Avengers Initiative, the family they’d built, the role he had to play in this reality…

It was all over. 

**Author's Note:**

> This work should update every other Monday - until the whole thing is completely finished, when the updates should come quicker.


End file.
